The son of an Antwerp textile merchant, van Dyck was apprenticed at ten and by his late teens was working in Peter Paul Rubens’s studio, where Rubens himself called him his "best pupil." He was already an independent master by 1618, and a period spent studying in Italy sharpened the elegant, fluid portrait style he would later bring to England.
In 1632 Charles I invited him to London, named him principal court painter and knighted him, giving him a substantial income and a house on the Thames. Van Dyck spent most of the rest of his career there, producing the grand, effortless-looking portraits of the English aristocracy that later generations of British portraitists spent a century imitating. He died in London in 1641, aged 42, after falling seriously ill on a trip to Paris.
Van Dyck paintings on display, museum by museum
Ashmolean Museum, Oxford
- Charles I and the Knights of the Garter in Procession — Gallery 47 (1638)
- Head of a Man wearing a Falling Ruff — Gallery 44 (1628)
- Head of a bearded Man wearing a Wheel Ruff — Gallery 44 (1628)
- Portrait of Charles I — Gallery 2 (17th century (1601 - 1700))
- Portrait of Gertrudis Wiegers, full-length, seated and turned towards the left, holding a rose and with a pet dog at her feet — Gallery 44 (1618 - 1620)
- The Deposition — Gallery 46 (1619)
- Thomas Howard, Second Earl of Arundel — Gallery 2 (1635 - 1683)
Pinacoteca di Brera, Milan
- Ritratto di dama — XXXI (1635)
Cleveland Museum of Art
- A Genoese Lady with Her Child — 212 Baroque Painting and Sculpture (c. 1623–25)
Dulwich Picture Gallery, London
- Emmanuel Philibert of Savoy, Prince of Oneglia — Room 4 (1624)
- Samson and Delilah — Room 4 (c. 1618–20)
- The Madonna and Child — Room 4 (c. 1630–32)
- Venetia, Lady Digby, on her Deathbed — Room 10 (1633)
Musée Jacquemart-André
- Portrait d’homme — Bibliothèque (vers 1620)
National Galleries of Scotland, Edinburgh
- Alexander Henderson, c 1583 - 1646. Presbyterian divine and diplomatist — Portrait (On Display) (About 1641)
- Princess Elizabeth, 1635 - 1650 and Princess Anne, 1637 - 1640. Daughters of Charles I — Portrait (On Display) (1637)
- The Lomellini Family — National (On Display) (About 1625 - 1627)
The National Gallery, London
- Charity — Room 21 (About 1627-8)
- Equestrian Portrait of Charles I — Room 21 (About 1638–9)
- Lady Elizabeth Thimbelby and her Sister — Room 21 (About 1635)
- Lord John Stuart and his Brother, Lord Bernard Stuart — Room 21 (About 1638)
- Portrait of Cornelis van der Geest — Room 21 (About 1620)
- Portrait of François Langlois — Room 21 (Probably early 1630s)
- Portrait of George Gage with Two Attendants — Room 21 (Probably 1621-2)
- Portrait of a Woman and Child — Room 21 (About 1620-1)
- Portrait of the Abbot Scaglia — Room 21 (1634)
- St Ambrose barring Theodosius from Milan Cathedral — Room 18 (About 1619-20)
- The Abbot Scaglia adoring the Virgin and Child — Room 21 (1634-5)
- The Giustiniani Longo Children (?) — Room 21 (1626-7)
- William Feilding, 1st Earl of Denbigh — Room 21 (About 1633-4)
National Portrait Gallery, London
- James Stanley, 7th Earl of Derby — Gawthorpe Hall, Burnley (oil on canvas, feigned oval, based on a work of 1636-1637)
- King Charles I — Kensington Palace, London (oil on canvas, based on a work of 1635-1637)
- King Charles I — Banqueting House, London (oil on canvas, based on a work of 1635-1636)
- Lord George Stuart, 9th Seigneur of Aubigny — Room 4 (oil on canvas, circa 1638)
- Sir Anthony van Dyck — Room 4 (oil on canvas, circa 1640)
- Sir Edmund Verney — Room 6 (oil on canvas, circa 1640)
- Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford — Lyme Park, Stockport (oil on canvas, circa 1633, based on a work of circa 1633)
- Thomas Wentworth, 1st Earl of Strafford — Room 4 (oil on canvas, circa 1636)
- William Laud — Room 4 (oil on canvas, based on a work of 1636)
Tate Britain, London
- A Lady of the Spencer Family — Exiles and Dynasties 1545-1640 (Room 1) (c.1633–8)
- Portrait of Sir William Killigrew — Exiles and Dynasties 1545-1640 (Room 1) (1638)
Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid
- Cristo en la Cruz — Sala A (1627)
Rooms and display status checked against each museum’s own collection database.
Listen to the commentary in the gallery
This list tells you where to look. In front of the actual painting, CulturAll adds the audio commentary: photograph the work or its label, listen, then ask your questions.
